1. You shall always have a crisis plan and keep it handyResponsible
management and practitioners of good corporate governance in South
Africa ensure that their companies and organisations have a fully
fledged PR crisis plan that deals with all eventualities. The plan must
be based on a bespoke vulnerability and risk audit and scenario
planning, and must integrate into an organisation's supply chain and
business continuity plans.

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Deloitte has published a survey of its Technology Fast 500 CEOs. A major problem is the scarcity of talent:

This year's big story is people. Baby boomers are beginning to retire in droves and there simply are not enough young people to replace them. This problem is particularly severe in developed countries, where decades of declining birth rates and shifting education patterns are producing chronic talent shortages in science, technology, engineering, and healthcare--fields at the very heart of the Deloitte Technology Fast 500. This talent crisis--which is expected to last for decades--has the potential to make the dot-com talent crunch of the late 1990s look like a walk in the park.

CEOs in the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 remain confident about their companies' near-term growth prospects. As was the case last year, more than 80 percent say they are "very confident" or "extremely confident" about sustaining their high level of growth over the next 12 months. Their biggest challenge will be "finding, hiring quality employees" as the factor that most contributed to their companies' growth, and over half of the respondents plan to expand their workforce by more than 25 percent in the next year.

Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Scott Moeller, coauthor of a book on the use of business and military intelligence in M&A deals and CEO of Executive Education at Cass Business School in London, England, points out that Scenario Planning can be helpful in thinking about M&A deals. Exactly so.

Scenario Planning is "fractal." It can be used to address risk and uncertainty at the product, business unit, and corporate levels. Understanding possible trajectories for industries, markets, portfolio
companies, and possible acquisition targets enables CEOs and Directors
to evaluate possible futures and to choose their most desirable future
and identify the key events and milestones leading to that future.

Sometimes it's useful to look a the future of the key business units and then at the future of the company and its portfolio of companies. Such a sequence of Scenario Planning projects can help the CEO and Directors approach acquisition and divestiture using more rigorous tools to evaluate many possible outcomes.

For example, one project for a Fortune 500 company convinced the CEO that he should sell a particular business unit because the competencies needed for success were fundamentally different than his other portfolio companies. His principal businesses essentially required making bets on 30 year capital investments in manufacturing plants where technologies evolved slowly. The business sold required competence in managing in markets whose technologies and structures were rapidly evolving.

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Being able to anticipate many different scenarios is one of the keys to success on a global scale:

As a consequence of complex technology, multiple regulatory
regimes and a trend towards geopolitical tensions, risk is becoming more complex.
This requires that executives be extremely attuned to establishing control and
risk management mechanisms and that they possess the foresight needed to
anticipate many different risk scenarios.

To be successful in this rapidly changing global environment, CEOs thought four characteristics were key:

Possess vision–
Exploiting the potential of ever-expanding markets and harnessing the power of technology
and innovation requires vision. Global executives must possess the vision
required to redefine their business models. They must also be able to inspire,
motivate and empower their people to fulfill that vision.

Demonstrate agility– The
successful global executive will be agile enough to react to rapidly changing
business conditions and to collaborate in support of new business models.

Become global citizens–
In the global marketplace, parochial or territorial thinking will not suffice. Global
business leaders must embrace diversity, understand and be able to reconcile
cultural differences, and contribute in meaningful ways to the communities in
which they do business.

Show courage– Important at any time, courage is even more necessary in
an environment defined by uncertainty and increased risk. The courageous
business leader boldly embraces new opportunities, responds to new risks and
takes on new responsibilities. Such a leader is prepared to make tough
decisions to ensure that the needs of sometimes competing stakeholders are
fairly and equitably met.

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Strategy Kinetics, and its network of affiliated consultants, can help CEOs anticipate alternative futures, manage in the face of uncertainty and complexity, reduce risk, and develop and implement strategies that are responsive to rapidly changing conditions. Email us to find out how.